


Irresistible

by Woven_Gulch



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2017-06-14
Packaged: 2018-11-13 22:05:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11194377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Woven_Gulch/pseuds/Woven_Gulch
Summary: Brad casts a spell. Taako can't resist.





	Irresistible

It wasn’t hard, it turned out, to find oddities when you lived on a floating moon base. When your coworkers consisted of arcanists and child prodigies and mind erasing jellyfish, “strange” became your new normal. Maybe that was why he found himself so surprised to be, well, surprised, when he stumbled across a rather mundane scene tucked quietly away in the bureau’s library that evening.

 

Brad often found company during his late night forays to the library. Odds were better than not that he would encounter Angus hunched over one of the base’s many tomes, scrutinizing and studying from behind his enormous spectacles. Other times he would find the boy asleep, and do his best to urge him back to his quarters in a half-dozing state.

 

His visit tonight was a late one, well past Angus’s often-debated curfew. When he heard pages shuffling from the next row over, he was fully prepared to use his well practiced and warm (but insistent) tone to urge the boy turn in for the night. What he didn’t expect, a beat later, was the sound of a fizzling spell and a frustrated, high pitched “FUCK!”

 

Brad froze where he stood - the voice was not a hard one to place. But this was a strange place for this voice to be, he mused. A small, if a little perplexed, smile crept over his face. He considered his next move carefully - it was unwise to sneak up on someone actively casting magic. Make his presence known from too far away, though, and Taako might blink out of existence just to avoid making small talk. 

 

Brad settled for slowly and quietly peeking his head around the bookshelf to observe the library’s workspace. There he saw Taako lounging lackadaisically, chair precariously balanced on its two hind legs, while both of his were crossed on the heavy oak table in front of him. In his lap was a large spellbook, bound in crimson leather and illuminated by the glowing fireplace that was slowly burning out in the hearth. The remnants of Taako’s failed spell crackled around his head in the form of small bursts of light, popping and flashing as the unharnessed magic dissipated around him. 

 

It was a pretty scene, truth be told, and one that had caught him off guard - Taako had so many sharp edges, with his biting words and sneering glares. Brad liked to tease him when he was like that - it was laughably easy to get a rise out of the wizard. It was even easier to make him blush deeply as he sputtered and tried to maintain the appropriate level of well practiced outrage and indignation he wanted people to  _ think  _ he was feeling. 

 

This was different though. This was strange. Taako with his guard down, with arcane firelight bouncing off the flecks of glitter in his eyelashes, catching on the jewels that adorned his ears, illuminating the golden smattering of freckles across that dusted his nose? As it turned out, it was also enough to make Brad throw caution to the wind. Once he was sure both of Taako’s hands were firmly occupied with the book, he took a step forward and cleared his throat.

 

\------------

 

The unexpected interruption was nearly enough to send Taako ass over teakettle. One hand flew up in the direction of the noise, while the other grasped blindly at his side for his Umbra staff. Half the incantation for fireball was out of his mouth by the time recognized the intruder. He snapped his jaws closed just in time to avoid incinerating his coworker and, thank the gods, managed to right his chair. 

 

“Bradson, what the  _ fuck  _ my guy?” was all he could strangle out.

 

The orc stepped out from behind the bookshelf and into the room, towering over him, a bemused smile on his face.

 

“Sorry about that,” he chuckled. He looked in no way, shape or form apologetic.

 

“Yeah, well, you’re lucky I didn’t fireball your ass,” Taako spat. 

 

He tried his best to settle back into his chair, attempting to look unperturbed. He willed his ears to return to their relaxed, half-cocked state from the straight up attention they were at currently. Taako knew that Brad delighted in playing his game, gently poking and prodding, trying to put Taako on the defensive.

 

“Do you mind if I sit?” Brad inquired politely.

 

Taako stared determinedly at the book in front of him, taking in exactly none of what he was reading. Without a glance up he shrugged. Next to him, a chair scraped across the floor and groaned as the enormous man settled in beside him.

 

After a long moment of awkward silence, Brad hummed. “So what are you reading?” he asked inquisitively. 

 

Taako’s eyes flicked up, shooting Brad a withering look. Nothing in all of Faerun had ever been as important as him maintaining focus on...whatever this book was, he reminded himself.

 

“What do you care?” he asked before he could stop himself. Another cursory glance noted a teasing smile on Brad’s face. His eyes darted back to the page. 

 

“I’m trying to work out this spell. It’d be a lot easier without your mug up in my business.”

 

“I’ve just never seen you study in here before,” Brad replied, leaning into Taako’s space and running his eyes over the text. “Didn’t figure you for much of a -” 

 

Brad’s brows furrowed in confusion. He double checked the incantation’s name, before letting out a low chuckle.

 

“Irresistible Dance?” he asked, a bit incredulously. “You know that doesn’t make YOUR dancing irresistible, right?” 

 

The thought seemed to amuse him greatly, Taako noted. He began to feel a flush creep up his neck when he realized Brad’s eyes had drifted slightly, out of focus and possibly imagining what  _ that  _ might look like.

 

He slammed the book on the table, returning Brad back to the conversation he had somehow, again, allowed himself to be dragged into.

 

“I know what it does. I’m trying to figure out a way to fuck with Merle, if you really gotta know.”

 

“What did he do now?”

 

“He made fun of Ang-” Taako bit his tongue. Shit. “Of a  _ coworker's  _ dancing while Johann was playing out on the quad last weekend.”

 

He shot Brad a look, daring him to point out his slip-up.

 

“We’ll see how he likes having to show his shitty dad moves off in front of everybody,” he mumbled, trying again to focus text. ”Can’t get the fuckin’ thing to go off though.”

 

With that Taako shoved the book away from him, frustrated with the entire endeavor. He covered his eyes, trying to block out the light and noise, attempting one final time to perform the deceptively tricky piece of magic.

 

“Do you want to see the spell performed?” Brad asked, after a moment.

 

Taako peeked one eye open, giving the man a sideways glance.

 

“I’m a bard. It’s a dancing spell,” he shrugged. Taako supposed that made sense.

 

“Go nuts,” he said with a wave of his hand. “Don’t know what good it’ll do, but I guess it can’t hurt.”

 

Brad gave the spell a final review, eyes roaming over the page from behind his spectacles. (Taako reminded himself that they were not cute, like,  _ at all _ .) He set his shoulders, placing his hands firmly on the oak table and taking a deep breath. With that, the orc began to sing.

 

Taako had heard Brad cast spells before. His style tended to be utilitarian - the least amount of oration needed to produce the desired results. More often than not his casting was closer to speaking in a sing-song manner that to anything with melody behind it. This, however...this was something else. The note started as a gentle hum, before deepening into something rich and throaty. He kept his lips pursed, a small smile on his face, as he found the tune. Finally, he opened his mouth and began to sing in earnest. 

 

Taako didn’t speak Orcish fluently, but it had enough linguistic similarity to Goblin that he could pick up the gist of the song. Something about cool autumn days and the feeling of returning to your hearth and your home after a long journey. Impossibly, he could also hear the incantation of the spell, woven subtly into the unfamiliar words and tones that formed in Brad's mouth. Taako felt the arcane energy wash over him. The urge to tap his fingers in time, to sway and dip with the music, needled at his mind, though without physical contact he wasn’t beholden to  the magic.

 

Taako would cheerfully launch himself off the moon base before admitting it to anyone, but he had tried his hand a bardic magic before it became clear that being a wizard was his true calling. He hadn’t been terrible at it - his lilting, melodic voice lending itself well to the craft. He had, however, quickly found it to be far too intimate to cast in front of other people, the inherent vulnerability keeping him from pursuing the trade in earnest. He was much better equipped to twirl his umbrella and drop a cool one-liner than he was to truly have to  _ perform  _ his magic in the most literal sense of the word.

 

Taako felt that here, now, as he listened to Brad sing, lulled into a bit of a stupor by the gentle humming and softly formed words. Almost without thinking, he let his hand to drift towards Brad’s, tracing his fingers lightly over the grain of the wood in time with the music. He skirted his hand forward and back, inching closer and closer. He hesitated for a final moment, but ultimately made a decision before logic or good sense could get the better of him. With a deft movement, he looped his lithe pinky around the orc’s much larger one. 

 

The effect was instantaneous - he immediately felt compelled to stand, to dance and spin and sway. But almost as rapidly, he felt a subtle shift - Brad quickly modulated his song, altering something in the tenor that Taako didn’t immediately recognize. A change in intent. Taako realized that he could still feel the arcane energy pulsing where they connected, but the spell was no longer a command - it was an  _ invitation _ .

 

Taako rolled his eyes, but couldn’t help but crack a small smile.  _ Ridiculous _ , he thought to himself, though he didn’t resist as Brad stood with him, his song faltering for a moment as let out a low laugh. He found himself wrapped in impossibly large arms, which were pulling him into a tender embrace. And there they began to sway, bathed in dying firelight. Taako closed his eyes and let himself be pulled in tighter.

 

Brad buried his face in the elf’s dark hair, but continued to sing. Taako relished in the sensation, Brad’s low timbre resonating through his skull, producing a vibration that snaked it’s way down his spine and pooled somewhere deep in his gut. Taako found himself completely enveloped, both in arcane energy and the sturdy orcish man who had him folded delicately against his chest.

 

“You know that I will absolutely magic missile your ass if you tell anyone about this, yeah?” he mumbled, though there was no trace of malice in his voice. He felt Brad grin and nod, face still hidden in his tresses. He could live with that. He sighed contently, tracing small circles in the small of Brad’s back with one hand, the other still linked at the pinky. As he inhaled, sandalwood and lavender flooded his nostrils.

 

Eventually the music came to an end, Brad letting a low, throaty note hold until he ran out of breath. He planted a gentle kiss on the crown of Taako’s head as he brush a strand of hair behind one of his long ears. With a small smile, he wordlessly offered Taako his arm.

 

“You fuckin’ sap,” Taako smirked, as he tried not to look too eager in accepting the invitation. Together the two men walked arm in arm out of the library, still swaying slightly in time with one another. 

**Author's Note:**

> Please enjoy this mountain of fluff, which was originally intended to be a 3-4 paragraph long drabble.


End file.
